The Confidential

The ACC Sports Blog

Archive for the tag “Syracuse”

Predicting the Orange

The football season will kick-off one week from today for the Syracuse Orange.  And that means that for beat writers and bloggers around the country, it’s PREDICTION TIME!  While there is reason for optimism in Syracuse (perhaps too much optimism among Syracuse fans/bloggers), the Confidential already analyzed Syracuse’s schedule, pointing out the likely wins, likely losses, and toss-ups and generally determined that this is a very unpredictable season. Syracuse’s floor is about 5 wins, while the ceiling is likely around 8 wins.

Here is what we know:  Read more…

2014 ACC Football School Media Guides

Most schools issue a media guide at the beginning of the football season.  These are FULL of useful and interesting information.  Here is a link to the ACC’s Media Guide in PDF form, as well as links to the 15 ACC school football media guides:

  1. Boston College: Link to PDF and index or Viewer
  2. Clemson: Link to PDF
  3. Duke: Link to PDF
  4. Florida State: Link to PDF
  5. Georgia Tech: Link to PDF or Viewer
  6. Louisville: Viewer
  7. Miami: Link to PDF
  8. North Carolina: Viewer
  9. North Carolina State: Link to PDF
  10. Notre Dame: Link to PDF
  11. Pittsburgh: Link to PDF
  12. Syracuse: Pending–check here
  13. Virginia: Link to PDF
  14. Virginia Tech: Link to PDF
  15. Wake Forest: Link to PDF

Enjoy!

Syracuse Fans and Jerami Grant: The Bigger Picture

The interwebs are aglow with the activity of Syracuse fans debating each other over where on the happy/sad continuum they should be relative to Jerami Grant’s NBA career.  On the one hand, a program’s fans should applaud all of its alums–even if they do not receive the sheepskin promptly or stay all four years.  On the other hand, how can a fan base get attached to a player that stays two years and leaves before even hitting stride?  This is not limited to Syracuse–this is a phenomenon throughout college basketball.

Read more…

New Syracuse Orange Page

The Confidential is going to create a quick summary page for each ACC school, with important links.  Today’s is Syracuse.  It may be found here:   https://atlanticcoastconfidential.com/syracuse-orange/

If you have a Syracuse Orange blog and would like to have reciprocal links, send us a direct message on Twitter or comment on this page.

Syracuse Football: The Over/Under

This article is the next in a series of articles in which the Confidential selects the over/under for football wins in 2014.  We’ll take a cursory look at the schedule and determine what we think is the point where folks will struggle to select “over” or “under.”  We hope people will share their comments as to “why” they are going over/under.  If you disagree with our over/under choice, of course, feel free to let us know too.  The thirteenth team up: Syracuse.  We are going with an over/under of 7.5.

 

Read more…

Men’s L-ACC-rosse Finals: Duke vs. Notre Dame

 

 

 

 

Duke

 

 

When the ACC announced the conference was expanding to include Syracuse, Pittsburgh, and Notre Dame (kinda) everyone recognized that it would be an elite basketball conference. However, with the exception of the Confidential, very few realized just how dominant the conference would be in lacrosse.

Despite the pending loss of Maryland to the B1G, and a big whiff by not landing Johns Hopkins, the ACC continues to be the best lacrosse conference in the country, further evidenced by the All-ACC finals between defending Champion, Duke, and Notre Dame on Memorial Day at 1pm.

Duke defeated Denver 15-12 in the semis, while Notre Dame crushed Maryland 11-5 to advance to the finals.

Women’s lacrosse is no different, pairing one team new to the ACC (Syracuse) against one that is leaving (Maryland) in the Championship game. Syracuse defeated conference-mate, Virginia 16-8 to earn a spot in the finals, while Maryland surpassed Northwestern 9-6. The final game is scheduled for Sunday, May 25th at 8:30pm.

 

 

 

ACC Lacrosse Update

The best conference in lacrosse, the Atlantic Coast Conference, continues to impress.  The latest top 20 for the men has all six schools ranked in the top 9.  The fourth place team in the ACC, Notre Dame, is ranked fifth overall after winning the ACC tournament.  Virginia, who was 1-4 in conference play, is ranked #8 overall.  There is simply no precedent for such top-to-bottom conference domination.

That being said, it is Loyolla and Denver that are atop the standings at #1 and #2.  and Johns Hopkins squeezes in between the ACC sextet at #6.  It was quite a coup for the Big 10 to land Johns Hopkins–the Confidential still bemoans the ACC’s failure to do so.  However, as lacrosse remains a non-revenue sport, there is only so much the conference could have or should have done in that regard.

There are few regular season games left for the ACC schools.  on Saturday, there are a trio of games, as Notre Dame hosts #19 Army, Maryland hosts Navy, and Syracuse hosts Colgate.  Duke travels to Boston on Sunday for its finale.

The women are similarly as impressive, with seven of the eight schools in the top 15.   Of course, with Maryland #1, Syracuse #2, North Carolina #4, and Boston College #5, an argument can be made that the women are doing even better than the men.

All in all, the ACC is simply dominant in lacrosse.  Let’s hope that the ACC can follow through on its dominant regular season by bringing home two trophies.

Syracuse Loses Jerami Grant

The news is out by now… the 2014-2015 Syracuse basketball team will be without Jerami Grant, who has decided to take his potential to the NBA.  The Confidential will take a deeeeeep breath and not analyze just how much this confirms everything that is wrong with the NBA right now.  Needless to say, if the NBA is going to draft Jerami Grant in the 15-20 range, he is wise to go now and cash in on the NBA foolishness.  But what does it do for Syracuse?

Read more…

Mike Hopkins and South Florida–Why Not?

There has been some discussion of Mike Hopkins, long-time Syracuse assistant, being a candidate at Boston College.  The Confidential wonders why Hopkins would consider leaving Jim Boeheim’s side to take over a clear rebuilding project in Boston College.  While Boston College is an underrated athletic program in both basketball and football, mostly due to its recent woes, this job simply does not seem like a wise move for Hopkins.  Instead, the Confidential posits that Hopkins and South Florida would be a good match.  Here is why.

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Syracuse Fans: Cut Trevor Cooney Some Slack

Over at TNIIAM, there has been much discussion of Trevor Cooney, who is undoubtedly in a significant slump.  However, this slump has caused Cooney’s three-point average to drop to a still-very-respectable 37.7%.  And this is after a seven game stretch where he has gone 10 for 51, or if you want to use the 10 games since his 33-point explosion against Notre Dame, he is 16 for 72.  After the Notre Dame game, he was 70 for 156 on the season.  That is an insane 44.8%.  Few players are going to keep up that pace.  It’s called law of averages, folks.

Read more…

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